Mike Chang
Mike Chang is an active member of the Glee club and the football team. Mike (along with Matt Rutherford and Noah Puckerman) was one of the three football players who joined Glee Club in the episode Preggers after winning their first football game. Also known as "Other Asian", he is considered New Directions' best male dancer. As of Audition, Mike is officially dating Tina Cohen-Chang. In the second season, he has a more important role and extra character development. Mike is portrayed by Harry Shum Jr. Biography 'Season One' In this season, hardly anything was known about Mike Chang at all. Although he is a member of the school football team, Mike does not appear until Preggers, in which Kurt Hummel joins the football team. Kurt, who for years has been a target of bullying by the football team, shocks them when he reveals himself to be an excellent place kicker, thanks to his years of dance training. The coach decides to use Kurt's unusual training methods for the rest of the team, and has Kurt teach them the dance moves for "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)." Much to everyone's surprise, the dance-training works spectacularly allowing them not only to become more fluid in their movements, but also allowing them to shock the rival school by performing the number on the field, and so, dancing wins the day. The football team wins their first football game that season. After the football game, Mike finds that he enjoyed dancing and performing, and decides to join the group, despite it being social suicide. It is later revealed in Vitamin D and Throwdown that Mike is a spectacular dancer in his own right, able to perform complicated lock-breakdown dance steps. In Vitamin D, Mike performs background vocals and stellar dance moves in "It's My Life/Confessions Part II". In Throwdown, when Sue steps up as co-director of New Directions, she recruits Mike (whom she calls 'Other Asian') and the other "minority students" into an "elite Glee Club". Mike performs background vocals in "Ride Wit Me and "Keep Holding On", and dances in "Hate On Me". Mike, Puck, Matt and Finn Hudson are later forced to choose between football and Glee by Coach Tanaka in Mash-Up. Much to the Glee Club's surprise, Matt, Mike, and Puck decide to rejoin Glee and sacrifice their spots on the football team. Coach Tanaka reconsiders the separation and allows the boys to return after Finn convinces Ken that they shouldn't be forced to choose between Glee Club and football. In Ballad, Mike teams up with Tina Cohen-Chang, who using Sue Sylvester old nickname for him, unenthusiastically calls him "Other Asian". Mike appears somewhat taken aback by the title. At the end of the episode, he performs "Lean On Me" with the rest of the club for Finn and Quinn. In Mattress, Mike performs a series of dance-like acrobatics on over-stuffed mattresses when the Glee Club is hired to do a mattress commercial. When the group at last reaches Sectionals, they are horrified to realize that Sue has given the opposing schools their set-list. Mike is seen buying popcorn before the performance, and silently admonishing Jacob Ben Israel for dancing to the Jane Addams Academy girls' rendition of "Proud Mary". With Finn taking over command of the Glee Club in Will's absence, Finn has Mike, Brittany, Santana, and Matt come up with an impromptu dance routine, as they are considered the four best dancers in the group. He goes on to choreograph the routine, despite admitting that it was "going to be choppy." He performs background vocals in "You Can't Always Get What You Want" and "My Life Would Suck Without You. " In Hell-O, Mike is seen in several glee club rehearsals. He dances with Rachel in "Gives You Hell" and sings background vocals in "Hello Goodbye." Later, in The Power Of Madonna, Mike watches "Express Yourself" with the rest of the male members, and sings background vocals in "What It Feels Like For a Girl" (rather enthusiastically) as well as "Like a Prayer". In Home, Mike and the rest of the glee club go to a roller rink because the auditorium is unavailable. He joins Mercedes in singing "Beautiful", and sings background vocals in "Home". In Dream On, Mike performs background vocals and dances in Artie's dream sequence of "Safety Dance". Artie and Tina were going to perform a tap dance routine together, but Artie persuades Tina to choose another male member of the Glee Club to do his part. Tina chooses Mike (calling him by his actually name for the first time) and the two tap dance together to "Dream A Little Dream", while Artie sings the lead. Later on, Mike enthusiastically watches the rendition of "Bad Romance" done by the New Directions girls and Kurt. He then sings background in "Shout It Out Loud" and "Beth", and defends Kurt with the rest of New Directions from Azimio and Karofsky at the end of Theatricality. After finding out that Sue Sylvester is going to be a judge for Regionals in Journey, the Glee Club fears that they may end up getting last place. At Regionals, Mike performs with New Directions in "Faithfully", "Any Way You Want It/Lovin', Touchin', Squeezin'", and "Don't Stop Believin'". He joins the rest of the club as they rush Quinn to the hospital as she goes into labor. The team returns to the competition only to find that they've been given last place, and thus club will be disbanded. As a way of showing their gratitude to Mr. Schuester, the New Directions members talk about how Show Choir has affected them. Mike confesses that he was was afraid to dance outside of his room prior to joining Glee Club. He then joins the rest of the group in singing "To Sir, With Love" to Mr. Schuester. After it is revealed that Glee has one more year, Mike celebrates with the rest of New Directions by listening to Mr. Schue and Puck perform "Over The Rainbow". 'Season Two' It is revealed in "Audition" that over summer vacation, Mike and Tina began working as counselors at "Asian Camp" where they taught music and arts to tech-savy Asian children. He and Tina found themselves growing more attracted to one another over the course of the summer. For Tina, the leading factor for the initial attraction were Mike's abs, which he would show-off while dancing. As a result of the mutual attraction, Tina broke off her relationship with Artie, whom she called a "bad boyfriend", and began one with Mike. The pair of them initially denied the relationship when interviewed by gossip blogger Jacob Ben Israel, but clasp hands confirming the relationship, while Jacob was still videotaping. Mike, Finn, Artie, and Puck help Sam audition for Glee Club. Mike dances and provides backup while Sam sings "Billionaire" and seems impressed by Sam, hoping he'll agree to audition for the rest of the club. Later on, he and Tina go to Mr. Schuester after finding out through their friends in the Asian community, that Rachel had sent possible Glee club recruit Sunshine Corazon to a crackhouse. The three of them furiously interrogate her, confirming that she had sent the girl to the crackhouse solely to make certain that the girl would not join Glee and take solos from her. In Britney/Brittany, Mike and Tina are still dating, which Artie bitterly refers to as "Asian Fusion." They are sitting next to each other during Carl's visit to the Glee Club and they Asian-kiss when it is revealed that neither of them have plaque. Artie, who does have plaque, sadly watches them Asian-kiss. Both Mike and Tina are seen in the background of the restaurant hanging out with Finn and Rachel in Brittany's fantasy of Me Against the Music. However, he was not visibly present during Artie's fantasy of "Stronger" in which the rest of the football team dances with Artie. Mike is shocked when Kurt yells at Mr. Schuester to let loose and stop being so uptight, wearing a look that implies disbelief, but at the same time wanting to laugh. When Rachel shows up to Glee wearing the outfit from "Hit Me Baby One More Time" Mike is staring at her, despite sitting next to Tina. In "Grilled Cheesus", Mike is seen comforting Kurt along with the rest of the Glee Club in regards to his father's heart attack. He dances along to "Only the Good Die Young" with the rest of New Directions and also sings back-up in "One of Us." Mike finally receives a solo in Duets, where he sings "Sing!" with Tina, though most of his lines in the song are technically spoken. He doesn't feel as if he's a good enough singer to do a real solo in front of everyone, and instead just wants to dance around Tina while she sings. Tina retorts that they have to sing together since they are duet partners, and confesses that she wants a real date at Breadstix, rather than going to an awkward dinner of dim sum with his mother. After his duet project, Mike admits that he is more confident in his singing voice, thus asking Mr. Schuester for the role of Dr. Frank-n-furter in "The Rocky Horror Glee Show". However, sadly, Mike's parents did not allow him to perform in the musical because of the promiscuous nature of the role. Mike still shows up at several of the club meetings and rehearsals for the show. He also dances with Tina and the rest of the club while Dr. Carl Howell auditions for the show with "Whatever Happened to Saturday Night?" At the end of the episode, when Mr. Schuester cancels the play, he tells the kids that the club will perform the Musical for themselves. They are shown doing "Time Warp" for themselves, and Mike plays Eddie. In Never Been Kissed, Mike and Tina talk in the hallway and Mike reveals Sam's "cool down" secret which involves thinking of Coach Beiste in a sexual sort of manner. Tina suggests they try it out and begin making out in an empty classroom, which results in Tina imagining the coach and muttering "Beiste." Mike, confused, gets jealous and even goes up to Coach Beiste and tells her to stay away from Tina, upset by Tina's reaction despite being directly responsible for Tina thinking about Beiste just a short scene earlier. At the boy's meeting to choose their songs for their mash-up, Mike exchanges a worried look with Finn; neither are happy about Kurt's idea's being shot down, but they both do neglect to defend Kurt. He performs "Stop! In the Name of Love/Free Your Mind" with the rest of the boys as an apology to Coach Beiste for the way they acted around her. During "The Substitute", Mike and the rest of the Glee kids are excited by the arrival of Holly Holiday who steps in as temporary glee teacher while Will is sick. He and the rest of the kids perform back-up vocal for her when she sings "Forget You" and later sings and dances in "Umbrella/Singin' In the Rain". His primary performance occurs in Will's illness-induced dream sequence, in which he and Will recreate the dancing and physical comedy of "Make 'Em Laugh". In "Furt", Mike is still seen to be part of the football team even though he was shown not to be present during the team's previous locker room meetings. He, along with Artie (under the request of her their girlfriends as well as their own personal concern for Kurt) stand up to Dave Karofsky in a bid to get him to stop picking on Kurt. Mike is seen slamming the locker door on Karofsky and demands for him to back off from Kurt. Karofsky pushes back, causing Mike to fall into Artie, knocking him out of the wheelchair, which causes Sam to step in and defend them. Later, he is seen getting massaged and iced by a loving and proud Tina while all of them recall the series of events. He goes on to proclaim that Sam was the "epitome of a leader". His true singing voice can also be heard in this episode's musical number, "Marry You". During the wedding proceedings, he can be heard harmonizing with Tina during one of the first few lines of the chorus. Mike also performs in "Just The Way You Are" along with the rest of New Directions. When Kurt announces that he's transferring to Dalton, Mike, along with the rest of Glee, looks genuinely upset about his leaving. In Special Education, Mike gets recognized for his dancing abilities and is chosen to dance alongside Brittany during the song "Valerie" in sectionals. Their working-relationship results in some insecurities in Tina, who starts to suspect Mike of cheating on her with Brittany because she tasted Lipsmackers when she kissed Mike, and Brittany wears Lipsmackers. However, Mike seems totally oblivious to this and appears confused when Tina calls him a jerk before their performance. He then proceeds to produce a stunning dance routine with Brittany during sectionals. By the end of the episode, he and Tina seem to have sorted out the misunderstanding, and he even comments positively on her changing back to her original style of clothes. They then share an "Asian kiss", and walk off to join the rest of New Directions in the choir room. Later, he performs with New Directions in "Dog Days Are Over". In "A Very Glee Christmas", Mike is slushied on camera for the very first time. Mike also helps to keep Brittany's belief in Santa Clause alive by sitting on Santa's knee and asking for Channing Tatum to "stop being in stuff." In "The Sue Sylvester Shuffle", Mike is one of the few football players who played both halves of the game. When Tina was tackled to the ground in the first half of the game, he expressed tender concern and immediately rushed to her side, but was relieved to find out that she would be alright. He then went on to dance in the "Thriller" mashup, and also performed in The Zombies classic, "She's Not There". In "Silly Love Songs", Mike spends the day with Tina and dedicates "P.Y.T."to her, dancing and performing back-up vocals (with Artie dedicating the song to Brittany). Later, Mike consoles Tina after she awkwardly breaks down into tears while serenading him. At the end of the episode, both Mike and Tina go to BreadstiX and embrace each other while watching the Warblers' performance. In "Comeback", Mike, Puck, Artie, and Sam come together to form a boy-band and do a cover of "Somebody to Love". Mike reasons that only "Bieber Fever" could get him out of his post-Valentine's Day slump with Tina, since flashing his abs had failed to get her attention. His abs were also featured during Lauren's performance of I Know What Boys Like, in which Lauren envisioned the entire Glee Club stripped down to their undergarments. In "Blame it on the Alcohol", Mike joins the rest of the Glee Club at Rachel's party, where they party hardy. Mike participates in several of the drinking games, taking shots of what looks like tequila (with salt and lime). Like the rest of the club, he experiences a horrible hangover the following Monday. He lies to his mother about the hangover by claiming that it was just the flu, which causes his mother to make him "panda hair" tea (which subsequently causes him to throw up all weekend). At the suggestion of Artie, he drinks a Bloody Mary prior to performing "Blame it on the Alcohol", and likewise, takes some of Rachel's mixed drink prior to performing "Tik Tok". Mike did not have any specific scenes in "Sexy", but is seen in the background enjoying the provocative nature of several of the performances, such as during "Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah)" and "Afternoon Delight". In Original Song, Mike is seen pushing a slushie cart across the stage during the performance of Loser Like Me. The rest of New Directions grabs a cup full of confetti from the cart (including Mike himself) and they all proceed to "slushie" the audience with bright red confetti. Trivia *Often called "other Asian" *His dance partner is usually Tina or Brittany *Considered the best male dancer in glee *Can pop and lock *Said he couldn't sing, despite providing back-up vocals in several episodes *Wishes Channing Tatum would stop being in stuff *Often goes out to dinner dates with his mom and Tina *He is #28 (Season 1), then #22 on the football team (Season 2) *Takes Spanish with Puck and Finn * Parents seem to exhibit the traditional Asian family stereotype Personality and Skills Despite being a member of the football team in Season 1, Mike appears to be much, much less cruel and much more sensitive than the rest of his teammates, having not shown to bully anyone on camera. After joining the Glee Club, Mike seemed to bond quickly with the rest of the group, often praising fellow members and those less popular than he is. He is shown to be good-natured, always smiling at rehearsals and visibly enjoying each and every performance from the other members. When the moment calls for it, he will often break into a spontaneous dance to complement the performance. Mike also seems to favor Glee over football, as seen when the coach ordered the players to choose between the two, he chose Glee. In fact, Mike comes to love the club so much, that he becomes visibly emotional at the prospect of the club being disbanded at the end of Season 1. In Season 2, it is further shown that Mike cares a lot for his friends in Glee Club and will go to great lengths to help them out. In Furt, he and Artie (who despite briefly competing for Tina seem to be friends) confront Karofsky about his treatment of Kurt. Mike and Artie both appear to be very upset and angry about the bullying. In The Sue Sylvester Bowl Shuffle, he joins the other Glee Club boys in confronting the rest of the football team for slushying Artie. "]]Aside from being a somewhat talented football player, Mike loves to dance, his style being pop-and-lock. While his capacity in singing seems to be sub-par from his performance in "Sing!" (which was exaggerated), he more than makes up for it in his spectacular dancing performances. His skill is so good, he is asked to choreograph the final number in "Sectionals" along with Matt, Santana, and Brittany. He also even appeared in a sickness induced dream that Will had, during which they together performed the song "Make 'Em Laugh", where they both performed amazing dancing feats, flips and physical comedy. During Special Education, Mike and Brittany collaborated together to create yet another piece of stunning choreography for their second time at Sectionals, this time relying heavily on acrobatic flips and aerial spins. He performs several of Michael Jackson's most iconic dance moves during a rendition of "P.Y.T." It is revealed in "Journey" that prior to joining Glee, Mike never allowed himself to dance outside of his bedroom for fear of being made fun of, revealing he was afraid of not fitting in. Mike also appears to have a low self-confidence about his singing voice, as shown in "Duets", not knowing if he could sing or not and thinking he was only good at one thing: dance. After his duet project, Mike says that he is more confident in his singing voice and his social skills, thus volunteering for the role of Dr. Frank-N-Furter in "The Rocky Horror Glee Show". This growth seems to be evident when he can be heard singing a song properly in "Furt". The musical number performed, "Marry You", had him harmonizing with Tina during the first few lines in the chorus, proving that he is indeed capable of singing. Relationships Tina Cohen-Chang Main article: Tina-Mike Relationship In Season 2, Tina breaks up with Artie and starts to go out with Mike. They developed feelings for one another over the summer, when they were both counselors at Asian Camp in charge of teaching tech-savvy Asian kids about the arts. During one flashback, they kiss in front of a group of kids, and one of them snaps a picture. Tina is shown to have become enamored by Mike's amazing abs during his dance routines in Asian Camp. It is unknown whether Tina actually cheated on Artie with Mike, or if she broke it off prior to their Asian-camp-romance. After shrugging off Jacob Ben Israel's notions about their romantic relationship as "racist", they are seen holding hands. Tina and Mike also are the two that figure out that Rachel gave Sunshine Corazon directions to go to an inactive crack house thanks to the Asian community being "very tight". After finding out, the two report Rachel's behavior immediately to Mr. Schuester. When the Glee club was assigned to do a duet, Tina is determined to win the dinner for two at Breadstix, her reason being that she wants a normal date with a normal salad, and not the not-so-normal dates with Mike and his mom with the not-so-normal chicken feet salad. Mike and Tina get into a fight about him singing the duet, and he suggests that they go to "Asian couples' therapy", causing Tina to groan and wonder why it has to be Asian. Tina then asks Artie to be her duet partner in order to win the free meal at Breadstix (as friends). Artie rejects her offer, and she convinces Mike to sing "Sing!" with her. Mike is afraid to sing at first, initially wanting to prance around Tina instead, but Tina boosts his confidence and supports him all throughout. In the end, they do a great job (Artie is seen with a somewhat jealous expression). Songs Solos (In A Duet) Season Two * Sing! (Tina) (Duets) Solos (In A Group Number) Season Two * Marry You (Furt) Dance Season One Season Two *Valerie (Special Education) *P.Y.T (Silly Love Songs) *Bubble Toes (A Night Of Neglect) Quotations ''Main Article: Mike's Quotations '' Category:Characters Category:William McKinley High School Students Category:New Directions Members Category:Main Characters Category:William McKinley High School Football Team Members